Adaptation Decay: Four More BBC Shows You May See Stateside

NBC's new Maria Bello-starring remake of Prime Suspect wasn't the first, and it definitely won't be the last

It's safe to say that NBC's Prime Suspect, a remake of one of the BBC's strongest copper dramas, will differ significantly from the original. Helen Mirren's Jane Tennison was curt, intuitive, and brooding—McNulty in sensible pumps without the slightest trace of mischief. She pursued murderers and pedophiles, rankled her superiors, and made a wreck of her personal life. A hard woman with a harder job, that Jane Tennison could be ever bit as unyielding as the cases that unfolded gradually, in motion picture time.

Maria Bello is Jane Timoney, a sassy broad who wears a jaunty, Michael Jackson-style fedora, runs into car doors to prove a point about initiative, and always finds time for a nice meal out. The grim, lonely cop in a grim, lonely world has been recast as the life of the party. Mirren gave us one of the great characters of television; Bello, in the time-honored tradition of Horatio Caine and Lenny Briscoe, figures that law enforcement is all about characters, like the kind who excel at graduation ads in yearbooks.

But Prime Suspect isn't the first attempt at Americanizing a British police show, and it almost certainly won't be the last. There's already been ABC's one-and-done adaptation of the furiously acclaimed Life on Mars. Stateside, the show's seriously metaphysical concerns gave way to actual space travel, while Harvey Keitel and Michael Imperioli pranced around in period costume as if intent on spoofing their careers.

Since 2009, Dreamworks has had its eyes on, and hooks in, the gnarly Wire in the Blood. The pilot, possibly already in production, will be directed by Breaking Bad's Terry McDonough and written by CSI: Miami's Ildy Modrovich. In other words, a show about the highly unpleasant, if fascinating task of profiling serial killers, could get filtered through the superhero/horror movie prism that has become central to American crime shows. With Wire in the Blood, the horrific nature of the crimes always places them front and center. By comparison, Criminal Minds is a soap opera, and for all its gore, strangely protective of its characters and viewers.

With that in mind, what problems might arise when another round of BBC imports hits network television? We predict four more potential redos, and make some constructive suggestions.

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Wallander

The Network: HBO

The Star: Nick Offerman

What to expect: Gators, guns, and gumshoes

By the laws of television, there's no way that this series (many British shows are actually a six-episode cycle of made-for-TV movies) hasn't been considered for American audiences. Based on Henning Mankell's Swedish mysteries, Wallander casts Kenneth Branagh as Kurt Wallander, the sad, impetuous light of his squad. Branagh is a massive bummer, but he pales in comparison to the outpost of civilization he polices. Working out of a small city, frequently traveling out into the hinterlands to deal with the strange things that happen out there. For all the nice furniture, and Branagh's star power, Wallander is about frontier ambiance. It could pretty easily be transplanted to Idaho, or some other forbidding part of America where militias, sinister libertarians, and virulent racists are likely to hang out in relative seclusion. It's the worst of human nature, and Wallander, himself a mess, continually finds himself smack dab in the middle of it.

American television likes to harp on the evils of the city. Wallander USA would be sort of like an arch, upmarket Winter's Bone, suggesting every week that red states are just as fucked up. That might not poll so well; maybe turn Wallander himself from existential black hole to a lovable loser, and set it in the ugly part of Florida? Pain clinics and bikers go a long way. There's plenty of room on television for a darker vision of Carl Hiaasen's terrain.

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Luther

The Network: FX

The Star: Idris Elba, reprising his BBC role

What to expect: A few jokes, smiles, and every now and then murder

This one has already gotten some traction stateside, due in large part to the presence of Stringer Bell, aka Idris Elba. The premise is simple, if absurd: Elba's Luther is a crime-solving mastermind who, in his darker moments, loses his shit and breaks things. Or kills people. He also finds himself entangled in an unlikely BFF relationship with a diabolical foxy physicist who is probably a serial killer. Luther is the sound of the entire world crashing down around one man, as he tries with all his might to hasten its undoing. Elba is overwhelming, if at times ridiculous, and his own turmoil seems to fuel the particularly awful crimes he's drawn to, as opposed to the other way around. Also, he inexplicably goes the entire show without a decent haircut, which would not fly if his office were in America. This one seems perfect for FX, right down to its insistence on morbid excess as a plot device, an internal state, and a never-ending Facebook update.

But if Wallander could do without the great Branagh, since the main character is his surroundings, it's very hard to imagine anyone other than Elba as Luther. It would be really funny if, in the American version, the original Luther—accent, ragged haircut, and strange notions of office culture—were reassigned to Newark. Just not Baltimore. We all know the crime down there is anything but melodramatic.

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Zen

The Network: Showtime

The Star: Patrick Dempsey

What to expect: A production credit for the dude from Entourage

An especially recent offering, Zen has nothing to do with Asia, or serenity, or anything suggested by its title. It follows Aurelio Zen, a detective in Rome whose quick wit and outsider cred (he's from Venice, or something) never stand in the way of every single Italian stereotype in the book. Corruption abounds, on-location shooting is easy on the eyes and, right, Rufus Sewell is positively dreamy in the lead role. There are shades of Wallander here—the time and place matter nearly as much as the leading man, and already, the original deals with an imagined, Anglicized foreign world.

The good news is that Zen, a visual page-turner with gilded edges, could benefit from an American production interested in pulling out all the stops. More car chases. Fancier suits. More tourist porn. And yes, more sex. In Wallander, there's one date for our hero. It's a set-up that almost brings about the downfall of banking. Zen has make-out sessions in cafes, sex on desks, even betting pools on who will first shag the office object of desire. Slick to a fault, with most plots resolved by a well-placed phone call or sly look, Zen might as well come to America and punch itself up another notch. People loved Angels and Demons, right?

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Inspector George Gently

The Network: CBS

The Star: Dan Lauria

What to expect: A slimmed-down Lauria doing his best Michael Chiklis impression

A dark horse, and more a Netflix streaming favorite than a recent powerhouse. However, George Gently just might be the ideal candidate to make the transition to American television. Set in 1964, one of those years that gives the show plenty to work with while never threatening to overwhelm it, George Gently focuses on the titular character, a veteran detective who has returned to the force after the death of his wife. He's honorable, and authoritarian, but also personable and sarcastic. The ladies can't resist him, and yet he makes sure to keep his eye on the goal at hand. Younger sidekick John Bacchus, is awkwardly stuck between the old ways of society and the changing times. Count on him to fill the Mad Men quotient that networks are grasping for this fall with Pan Am and The Playboy Club. It's hard to tell if he's bumbling or learning. And yet somehow, Gently always ends up more progressive and sensitive.

George Gently is a first-rate procedural; it also magically splits the difference between social satire and social commentary. The characters are strong, the plots crisp, and the seriousness neither too dependant on serious acting nor any kind of "very special episode" subject matter. Things come up. Gently works through them as part of the case, teaches a lesson, then takes it all in stride once his work is done. In fact, it might be even more American than the most American procedurals.

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